Micromax Launched Their First Smartphone With CyanogenMod in India

You may or may not heard of Micromax, but the company is becoming well known for its recent dispute with OnePlus over an exclusive partnership with Cyanogen. Now the smartphone at the center of the fiasco has gone on sale in India, with CyanogenMod pre-installed.

Named Yureka, the device is the first from Micromax’s new “Yu” brand, and it’s pretty high-end compared to other Micromax smartphones. In addition to its 5.5-inch 720p display, the handset packs a 64-bit Snapdragon 615 processor, 2GB of RAM, 16GB of internal storage, and a microSD card slot.

The Yureka also has a 13-megapixel camera on its back, a 5-megapixel camera on its front, a 2,500mAh battery, and 4G LTE connectivity. The dual-SIM handset’s biggest selling point for many, however, will be its software; it ships with CyanogenMod 11 pre-installed, giving users a taste of pure Android 4.4.4 KitKat with some additional features and customizations baked in.

It’s that software that has caused the dispute with OnePlus; Micromax signed a deal with Cyanogen, Inc. that gave it exclusive rights to distribute CyanogenMod in India — meaning no other smartphone maker could do so. As the OnePlus One ships with CM, too, it caused a stir when it made its debut in India earlier this month.

If OnePlus wants to continue selling its smartphone in India, it must first remove CyanogenMod, and the Cyanogen logo from the back of its device. And if you want to buy a device that runs CM out of the box in India going forward, the Micromax Yureka now looks like a better option. It’s also cheaper at just Rs. 8,999 (approx. $147).

Sid Goswami is a tech enthusiast, besides being an avid Android fan and blogger, Sid wants to be a photographer and a designer. He can usually be found reading through blogs, taking photos. He's a student and a PHP web developer.